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US Tourism On The Decline, Cruise News and Barbados Food: This Week's JimBits

U.S. Tourism Falling

Europe is still king. But Mexico is gaining strength. And the U.S. is on a slide.

New figures from the United Nations World Tourism Organization show France is still king of the world tourism castle, with 86.9 million visitors last year. That’s a healthy increase of 8.3 per cent.

Spanish tourism, fuelled in part by a steady hike in visitors to Barcelona, rose 8.6 per cent last year and reached 81.8 million; not that far off the gold medal position.

The U.S. still managed a third place finish, but visits to the land of Trump fell 3.8 per cent last year; a marked contrast to figures in almost every other part of the world. The U.S. recorded 75.9 million visitors last year, the UNWTO said.

The next three were China (60.7 million, up 2.5 per cent), Italy (58.3 million, up 11.2 per cent) and Mexico, which saw visits surge by a full 12 per cent, rising to 39.3 million arrivals.

Rounding out the top ten were the UK (37.6 million, up 5.3 per cent), Turkey (37.6, up a truly remarkable 21.3 per cent), Germany (37.5 million, an increase of 5.2 per cent) and Thailand, with 35.4 million visitors (up 8.6 per cent).

U.S. Travel officials met with President Donald Trump on Tuesday of this week to express concern about the travel and tourism industry, which is a major economic driver for the American economy. Attending the session was U.S. Travel Association President and CEO Roger Dow, as well as senior officials from Marriott, Hilton and Wyndham hotels.

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